I dreamt I was host of a PBS show
This Old Jew
with tradesmen – plumbers, carpenters, electricians –
pulling at frayed wires, shaking loose pipes
testing old joists. 
After careful consultation,
they conclude
best to demolish
and build anew. 

After seventy,
every lump is a bump in the night.
A swelling far from swell,
a metastatic mess
‘til daylight rolls in
and sends my dread to the mirror,
reflection witness to our evil emperor:
gravity,
whose pull, first gentle, just a tug
and our padded falls as we teetered
like drunken sailors, with steps unsteady and joyous.

Gravity, once conquered, soon conquers.
Old is what happens to the aged.